Only few days ago we followed how US Navy destroyed American falling and malfunctioning spy satellite USA 193 by shooting a tactic missile. Now there is another satellite falling uncontrolled. This time it is a Russian malfunctioning satellite, called Kosmos 2430 rkt. The Russian space debris is going to enter the atmosphere already in few days.

The falling Russian satellite was photographed in last Tuesday night in Finland, reports Avaruus.Fi, a Finnish astronomy magazine. The falling satellite Kosmos 2430 rkt was captured by a camera of Finnish fireball research group. In the picture one can see about 60 degrees arc, which has maximum brightness of -1 magnitudes, which is comparable to the brightness of Sirius. The falling satellite was captured by another Finnish camera as well. Based on the data from these two different sources, the altitude of the satellite was estimated to be only 207 kilometers.

Finnish astronomers started to find out what is going on. Soon they found out that the target is a Russian falling satellite, Kosmos 2430 rkt, which is a debris of the rocket launched in October 2007. This uncontrolled falling Russian space debris was also noticed abroad and it is expected to fall in few days.

The location and time where the Russian space debris is going to fall is impossible to predict because the density of the atmosphere alternates much. The most probable touchdown time is the Monday-Tuesday night at Eastern European Time. It is possible that the satellite will drop to Finland, but it is not probable. The falling space debris has a diameter of two meters, but most of the satellite will burn in the atmosphere.

Even though an uncontrolled falling satellite is always a risk, it is also an interesting and rare object for astronomers. During the weekend many Finnish amateur and professional astronomers spend their nights outside waiting for Kosmos 2430 rkt to fly across the sky.

Original source of the news is Avaruus.Fi website.

You can watch Kosmos 2430 rkt orbiting in Heavens-Above.Com website.